The Affairs of Susan | |
---|---|
Directed by | William A. Seiter |
Screenplay by | Thomas Monroe László Görög Richard Flournoy |
Story by | Thomas Monroe László Görög |
Produced by | Hal Wallis |
Starring | Joan Fontaine George Brent |
Cinematography | David Abel |
Edited by | Eda Warren |
Music by | Friedrich Hollaender |
Color process | Black and white |
Production company | Hal Wallis Productions |
Distributed by | Paramount Pictures |
Release date |
|
Running time | 110 minutes |
Country | United States |
Language | English |
The Affairs of Susan is a 1945 American romantic comedy drama film directed by William A. Seiter and starring Joan Fontaine, Walter Abel, George Brent, Dennis O'Keefe and Don DeFore. It is also known as Chameleon.
Susan Darell, a successful dramatic actress, returns to New York City from a tour entertaining the troops overseas. She is about to marry Richard Aiken, even though they have only known each other for a few weeks. Then Richard discovers that Susan has an ex-husband (and her current Broadway producer) named Roger Berton and two other former boyfriends when he sees their pictures in her living room.
At a cocktail party, he meets all three, each of whom describes her as an entirely different person. Worried, he invites them all to dinner, where he asks them to tell him all they know about her. Roger is willing, but the other two start to walk out. However, when Roger starts reminiscing about Susan, they sit back down.
Roger meets Susan while on vacation in Rhode Island. When actress Mona Kent shows up, hoping to be cast as Joan of Arc in his next production, he flees by rowboat to an island. He talks a man into letting him board at his house for a while. He meets Susan, the man's niece, who lives there. Initially suspicious of her, he discovers that she is straightforward and honest and completely uninterested in acting. However, he thinks she is perfect to play Joan and makes her an actress, against her strong resistance. Then they fall in love and get married. Just before the premiere of Joan of Arc, Mona shows up and tries to sabotage it by getting a naive Susan drunk. Roger finds out in time and sobers her up. Susan draws rave reviews, but hardly anyone comes to see the play. Roger becomes repeatedly annoyed when Susan's complete honesty and forthrightness cause trouble for him. They divorce as a result.
Next up is Mike Ward, a wealthy lumberman from Montana. He meets Roger in a bar. When Roger sees how rich he is, he invites Mike to his office to discuss Mike investing in Roger's next show. A more sophisticated and less honest Susan barges in during the meeting, and taking a lesson from Mona, flatters Mike and takes him to lunch. Mike falls in love and begins proposing to her in a nightclub. Susan starts to let him down gently when Roger barges in and, assuming the worst (and wanting to reconcile with her), infuriates Susan into accepting Mike. However, Mike finds out about Susan's (fairly innocent) lying and breaks up with her.
Then novelist named Bill Anthony meets Susan in a park. Under Bill's influence, Susan turns into an intellectual. When Roger tells her that Bill does not believe in marriage, she does not trust him. She gets Bill drunk, knowing that when he is intoxicated he will agree to anything, and sets out to find a justice of the peace to marry them, but at the last moment, changes her mind. Back in the present, Bill regrets that she did not go through with it.
Reassured, Richard decides to go ahead with the marriage. However, Mike and Bill both propose to Susan again. She gently turns them down. Roger tells her that when they were first married, she was too young. Now she has grown up. She ultimately chooses him over Richard.
The film was nominated for Academy Award for Best Story in the 18th Academy Awards, but lost to The House on 92nd Street . [1]
Critic Bosley Crowther wrote in The New York Times , "Producer Hal Wallis should have condensed the whole romp into an hour or so and not the two hours which the picture takes to run its course." [2] He thought all four male leads gave capable performances, but found Fontaine's to be "very uneven". [2]
The Emperor Waltz is a 1948 American musical film directed by Billy Wilder, and starring Bing Crosby and Joan Fontaine. Written by Wilder and Charles Brackett, the film is about a brash American gramophone salesman in Austria at the turn of the twentieth century who tries to convince Emperor Franz Joseph to buy a gramophone so the product will gain favor with the Austrian people. The Emperor Waltz was inspired by a real-life incident involving Franz Joseph I of Austria. Filmed in Jasper National Park in Canada, the picture premiered in London, Los Angeles, and New York in the spring of 1948, and was officially released in the United States July 2, 1948. In 1949, the film received Academy Award nominations for Best Costume Design and Best Music, as well as a Writers Guild of America Award nomination for Best Written American Musical.
Tomorrow Is Forever is a 1946 black-and-white romance film directed by Irving Pichel, and starring Claudette Colbert, Orson Welles and George Brent. It was also the film debut of Richard Long and Natalie Wood. It was distributed by RKO Radio Pictures and was based upon the 1943 serialized novel of the same name by Gwen Bristow.
Roger H. Sterling Jr. is a fictional character on the AMC television series Mad Men. He formerly worked for Sterling Cooper, an advertising agency his father co-founded in 1923, before he became a founding partner at the new firm of Sterling Cooper Draper Pryce in late 1963. Sterling was portrayed by John Slattery.
Something to Live For is a 1952 American drama film starring Joan Fontaine, Ray Milland, and Teresa Wright, directed by George Stevens, and released by Paramount Pictures. The screenplay by Dwight Taylor was the first to focus on the Alcoholics Anonymous program as a means of overcoming an addiction to liquor.
This Above All is a 1942 American romance film directed by Anatole Litvak and starring Tyrone Power and Joan Fontaine as a couple from different social classes who fall in love in wartime England. The supporting cast features Thomas Mitchell, Nigel Bruce, and Gladys Cooper. Set in World War II, the film is adapted from Eric Knight's 1941 novel of the same name.
Frenchman's Creek is a 1944 adventure film adaptation of Daphne du Maurier's 1941 novel of the same name, about an aristocratic English woman who falls in love with a French pirate. The film was released by Paramount Pictures and starred Joan Fontaine, Arturo de Córdova, Basil Rathbone, Cecil Kellaway, and Nigel Bruce. Filmed in Technicolor, it was directed by Mitchell Leisen. The musical score was by Victor Young, who incorporated the main theme of French composer Claude Debussy's Clair de Lune as the love theme for the film.
The Macomber Affair is a 1947 film directed by Zoltan Korda and distributed by United Artists. Set in British East Africa, its plot concerns a fatal love triangle involving a frustrated wife, a weak husband, and the professional hunter who comes between them. It stars Gregory Peck, Joan Bennett, and Robert Preston.
The Wife Takes a Flyer is a 1942 romantic comedy film made by Columbia Pictures, directed by Richard Wallace. The film stars Joan Bennett and Franchot Tone. The screenplay of The Wife Takes a Flyer was written by Jay Dratler, Gina Kaus and Harry Segall. The film's music score is by Werner R. Heymann.
Wait Until Dark is a 1967 American psychological thriller film directed by Terence Young and produced by Mel Ferrer, from a screenplay by Robert Carrington and Jane-Howard Carrington, based on the 1966 play of the same name by Frederick Knott. The film stars Audrey Hepburn as a young blind woman, Alan Arkin as a violent criminal searching for some drugs, and Richard Crenna as another criminal, supported by Jack Weston, Julie Herrod, and Efrem Zimbalist Jr.
The Woman in Question is a 1950 British Murder-mystery film directed by Anthony Asquith and starring Jean Kent, Dirk Bogarde and John McCallum. After a woman is murdered, the complex and very different ways in which she is seen by several people are examined. It was loosely adapted into the 1954 Indian film Andha Naal.
The Private Affairs of Bel Ami is a 1947 American drama film directed by Albert Lewin. The film stars George Sanders as a ruthless cad who uses women to rise in Parisian society, co-starring Angela Lansbury and Ann Dvorak. It is based on the 1885 Guy de Maupassant novel Bel Ami. The film had a 1946 premiere in Paris, Texas. The score is by Darius Milhaud.
Night Song is a 1948 American drama film directed by John Cromwell and starring Dana Andrews, Merle Oberon and Ethel Barrymore.
Doll Face is a 1945 American film released by 20th Century Fox and directed by Lewis Seiler starring Vivian Blaine as "Doll Face" Carroll. It also stars actor Dennis O'Keefe and singers Carmen Miranda and Perry Como. The film is based on the 1943 play The Naked Genius written by Gypsy Rose Lee. In the opening credits, she is billed under her birth name, Louise Hovick. The film is also known as Come Back to Me in the United Kingdom.
September Affair is a 1950 American romantic drama film directed by William Dieterle and starring Joan Fontaine, Joseph Cotten, and Jessica Tandy. It was produced by Hal B. Wallis.
Holiday for Lovers is a 1959 DeLuxe in CinemaScope comedy film directed by Henry Levin. Based on a 1957 play of the same title by Ronald Alexander, the film stars Clifton Webb, Jane Wyman, Jill St. John and Carol Lynley.
Diplomatic Courier is a 1952 spy film noir directed by Henry Hathaway and starring Tyrone Power, Patricia Neal and Stephen McNally. The nightclub scene in the film features actor Arthur Blake, famous for his female impersonations, impersonating Carmen Miranda, Bette Davis, and Franklin D. Roosevelt. The plot was loosely adapted from the 1945 novel Sinister Errand by British writer Peter Cheyney.
From This Day Forward is a 1946 American drama film directed by John Berry, starring Joan Fontaine and Mark Stevens.
Those Endearing Young Charms is a 1945 American comedy film directed by Lewis Allen and written by Edward Chodorov from his play of the same name and starring Robert Young, Laraine Day, Ann Harding, Bill Williams and Marc Cramer.
The Way of All Flesh is a 1940 American drama film directed by Louis King and written by Lenore J. Coffee. The film stars Akim Tamiroff, Gladys George, William "Bill" Henry, Muriel Angelus, Berton Churchill and Roger Imhof. It was released on July 5, 1940 by Paramount Pictures.
Dear Ruth is a 1947 romantic comedy film starring Joan Caulfield, William Holden, Mona Freeman, Billy de Wolfe and Edward Arnold. It was based on the 1944 Broadway play of the same name by Norman Krasna.